The Crux is the third studio album by the American actor and musician Joe Keery, under his musical alias Djo. It was released independently under AWAL on April 4, 2025, and served as the follow-up to his previous album, Decide (2022). Keery co-produced The Crux with his frequent collaborator Adam Thein at Electric Lady Studios in New York City. Three singlesâÂÂ"Basic Being Basic", "Delete Ya", and "Potion"âÂÂpreceded the album. Upon its release, it was met with generally favorable reception from music critics. To promote The Crux, Keery embarked on the Back on You World Tour and Another Bite Tour between February and October 2025.
On September 12, 2025, The Crux Deluxe, a companion album containing 12 new tracks, was released. Despite the Deluxe label, Keery stated that he does not consider it a reissue of The Crux.
Joe Keery saw breakthrough success in his musical career, under the alias Djo, with the sleeper hit "End of Beginning" (2022). One of the singles from his second studio album, Decide (2022), it was the sixth song with the most streams in 2024 and charted in 41 countries, including in the United States with a peak at number 11. It also received certifications in nearly 20 nations. Keery started teasing his third album on social media at the beginning of 2025.
Keery worked with his frequent collaborator Adam Thein for The Crux. They co-produced the album at Electric Lady Studios in New York City. According to DIY, the lyrical themes center on "a hotel housing guests who are all [...] at crossroads in their life".
On January 24, 2025, Keery announced his third album, The Crux, and revealed its track listing and cover artwork. He also released its lead single, "Basic Being Basic", and performed it on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon four days later. The album was supported by a concert tour titled Back on You World Tour between February and June 2025, which passed through North America, Europe, and Australia. The American band Post Animal, which Keery was part before his solo career and later rejoined, served as the opening act. "Delete Ya" was released as the second single on February 27, 2025, followed by "Potion" on April 2. The Crux was released on April 4, 2025, via the distribution company AWAL.
The Crux debuted at number 50 on the US Billboard 200, including number 11 on the Independent Albums and number 10 on the Top Alternative & Rock Albums charts selling 8,000 pure album sales. As of July 2025, the album has sold 79,000 equivalent album units in the US.
On the review aggregator site Metacritic, The Crux received a weighted mean score of 73 out of 100 based on 10 critics' reviews, indicating "generally favorable" reviews. The music website Pitchfork gave the album a 5.9 out of 10, praising its "vibey prompts", while simultaneously criticizing the album for its "tendency to mistake mere observation for insight" and for being "frictionless" and "uncanny". Rolling Stone awarded the album 3.5 stars, referring to it as "the best music of his career". Paste<nowiki/>'s Mariel Fechik called The Crux "instrumentally lush and expansive," which offers a "vivid warmth to the album's sound." Alfie Verity at Under the Radar described the album as "a well pruned garden of musical history centered around DjoâÂÂs charming storytelling and personality." The site AnyDecentMusic? gave it a score of 7.4 out of 10, based on their assessment of the critical consensus from 11 reviews. On November 7, 2025, The Crux received a 2026 GRAMMYs nomination for Best Album Cover.
All tracks are written by Joe Keery; "Lonesome Is a State of Mind", "Delete Ya", and "Egg" also written with Adam Thein.
Credits adapted from Tidal.
The Crux Deluxe is a companion album to The Crux, released independently under AWAL on September 12, 2025, without prior announcement. It contains 12 new songs written, recorded, and produced by Keery and Thein at Electric Lady Studios while they worked on The Crux, and completed months after the album's release. The collection was preceded by three singles from the album's tracklist ("Carry the Name", "It's Over", and "Awake"), with each song being released daily between September 8 and 10.
The Crux Deluxe contains songs left out of the original album, and serves as an "alternate perspective" of the album's titular Crux hotel. On social media, Keery stated that it is "not so much a double album but an expansion of the world of [the initial album] that stands on its own as a unique body of work". Several tracks, including "It's Over" and "Who You Are", see Keery melancholically accepting the end of a relationship.
The songs incorporates several genres, including psychedelic rock, synth-pop, electropop, folk, and blues. Stereogum Chris DeVille compared the first track, "T. Rex Is Loud", to the glam rock music of the English musician Marc Bolan, who is mentioned by name in the song's chorus. It is followed by the acoustic pop song "Love Can't Break the Spell" and the synth-rock "Mr. Mountebank", the last of which predominantly incorporates the use of Auto-Tune.